PATT ITAC Report for Semester 98B

1. Introduction

This document details the allocations for telescope time made by the ITAC for the semester 98B (1st August 1998 - 31st January 1999).

2. Allocations

The individual partner TAGs hold meetings in their respective countries prior to the PATT session to assess applications deemed by the JCMT Board rule to be from their own country. At these meetings informal numbers of shifts are nominated for each application in a priority order. The Chairpersons of each TAG bring their respective lists to the PATT where the ITAC combine the awards, include discussion of the engineering and commissioning requirements, and assess the International applications. The final allocations of shifts are made by the ITAC.

Applications considered            

UK status#               85
Canadian status#         35 
Netherlands status       24 
International status     23 
University of Hawaii      87 
TOTAL:                  174 

# 7 UK starred applications & 3 Canadian carry-overs have been included in this total.

The PATT meeting was held at the Falcon Hotel, Stratford, UK on 2nd & 3rd June 1998.

It should be noted that if the PI on an application is a JCMT staff member based in Hilo, then the application is assessed by the appropriate national TAG. However, by Board rule, International status is given to any application where the only named collaborator from any partner country is a JCMT staff member. International applications are assessed by the ITAC members at their meeting.

Time Available  (in 16-hour nights)                        

No. of nights in semester 98B      183.0 
Engineering & Commissioning         25.0 
University of Hawaii (10%)          15.5 
Director's discretionary use         4.0 
Available for PATT science:        138.5 

The above table indicates the order in which nights are removed from the total available for the semester. The table below indicates the allocations using the JCMT Board formula for attributing applications to countries.

Awards (in 16-hour nights)            

UK status                  61.9
Canadian status            27.6 
Netherlands status         21.6 
International status       27.4 
University of Hawaii       15.5 
TOTAL allocation:         154.0 

3. Designated Service time

Allocations for this semester are:

CDN = 5.0 shifts allocated;

NL = 0 shifts allocated (with 7 hours set as Nlflex);

UK = 0 shifts allocated (with up to 40 shifts in the UKflex program);

INT = 0 shifts allocated (with 29 hours as INTflex).

4. Non-standard Instrumentation

There were no non-standard instruments allocated time this semester.

Instrument distribution             

A-band                  11% 
B-band                  13% 
C-band                   6% 
SBI                      5% 
SCUBA polarimeter        4%
SCUBA                   60% 

5. Applications with Long-Term Status

L/M/98B/U30 was given a further 5 shifts in 99A to complete observations of the Galactic Centre region subject to a satisfactory report on progress with the combined semester 98A and 98B observations.

6. Short Baseline Interferometry

There was considerable difficulty in making an acceptable arrangement for an SBI session in semester 98B due to the delay in obtaining information about CSO applications. The deadline for CSO submissions had been set for May 31st which was too close to the iTAC dates to obtain details. However the number of highly-rated PATT applications merited an SBI session and therefore a period of 8 complete nights plus 1 night for E&C setup was set aside for observations.

7. Engineering & Commissioning

A significant period of time has been set aside in October to make seasonal adjustments to the antenna. These adjustments together with thermal data from the antenna should enable a much improved surface rms accuracy.

Time has been allocated for commissioning of RxA3i early in the semester. Some shifts have been set aside for commissioning of the high-frequency component (D-band mixers) of RxW according to the commissioning plans made available by the instrument builders. In addition there is commissioning time for both SCUBA and for its polarimeter.

8. Fallback Programmes

A number of applications have been approved by the ITAC to be included in the schedule should the weather not be appropriate for the primary observations on any night. All applicants (allocated and fallback) have been requested to submit a completed template as soon as possible so their observations can be included on the queue system.

Applicants with starred proposals who have not submitted a complete template by the end of the first month of the semester (31st August) will lose the starred status of the application.

9. The Flex System for the UK

The UK TAG allocated time for only 96.5 shifts of its final allocation of 141 shifts. There is an outstanding 28.5 shifts of starred applications from semester 98A, some of which may be carried over into this semester. Some of these will be completed during semester 98A thus releasing further time for UKflex. The intention is that each high-frequency allocation be extended by typically 50% using UKflex time, thus increasing the chance of obtaining suitable weather to complete the high-frequency program. Under weather conditions unsuitable for the high-frequency observing, the current observers or staff scientist would undertake observations from the UKflex list in serviced mode in priority order. Successful applicants on the UKflex list have been informed that they have to submit complete templates for their observations but that there is no guarantee that any part of their program will be done during the semester.

10. The Flex System for Other Partners

A flexible system is already in operation by the Netherlands community. The Canadian community intend to begin a flexibly queued scheme starting with semester 99A.

11. Queue-based Flexible Implementation

All applications for semester 98B were nominated weather grades by the national TAGs prior to the ITAC meeting. These weather bands will be used to determine whether the primary project will continue or whether a fallback application will be implemented.

12. Electronic Submission

The expansion of the trial scheme to include the UK community was extremely successful. Within 48 hours of the deadline almost all applications (Canadian and Netherlands sets were ftp-ed across and inserted) were on-line at the JAC with 2 hardcopies prodcued. Only a few (less than 6) applications were posted as hardcopy to Swindon, most of which were later obtained in electronic postscript. The JCMT application template (PATT3) has been modified for use by ALL applicants so that all partners have a similar postscript format.

13. Modifications to the UK (and International) Service Application Procedures

The UK TAG made some changes to the submission and assessment procedures for the UK and International service applications. The details were contained in an announcement circulated to the community in late July. It is contained elsewhere in this newsletter.

11. Procedures for Semester 99A

The deadline for for semester 99A (1st February 1999 through 31st July 1999) applications is 30th September 1998 for ALL applicants. This deadline encompasses applications for all available instrumentation on the JCMT (RxA2, RxB3, RxW, SCUBA, and the SCUBA polarimeter). There is also likely to be an SBI run during the semester.